Public Accounts Committee on April 22nd, 2026

[Brad Redekopp, Conservative, Saskatoon West, SK]

Will you be revising the instructions given to the frontline officers to reflect that?

[Ted Gallivan]

Yes.

[Brad Redekopp, Conservative, Saskatoon West, SK]

Okay.

Given that the IRCC later removed the express entry job offer points, specifically to reduce the illegal buying and selling of LMIAs, are you concerned, Auditor, that the same pattern you found in the student stream, which were risks identified but with weak follow-through, may also exist in work permits and permanent resident streams?

[Karen Hogan]

Again, it's difficult for me to extrapolate. We saw that extensions of study permits or applications for other types of permits were done with what I'll call a light touch, because there was an assumption of rigour the first time through. We saw that wasn't always the case.

There is a concern there that now that risks have been identified, the immigration department will look at how it treats individuals who perhaps made it through under false pretenses or with fraudulent documentation. This is to make sure that you don't apply the typical light touch on an extension, and that you add rigour when rigour is needed.

We have flagged all these cases to the department. It's up to the department to handle the cases we've identified, but also to see if there are others within the student stream or other streams.

[Brad Redekopp, Conservative, Saskatoon West, SK]

Mr. Gallivan, have you found evidence of fraud in your first few weeks as deputy minister?

[Ted Gallivan]

There certainly was a practice of people falsely claiming to be students only to claim asylum. That's the kind of fraud that affected the student direct stream, and that's one of the key drivers to discontinue it.

The concern now is what we do with the people who came in while the program was in place. The commitment we've taken is to follow-through on all of those cases.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Thank you. That is your time.

It's now over to Mr. McKinnon for six minutes, please.

[Ron McKinnon, Liberal, Coquitlam—Port Coquitlam, BC]

Thank you, Chair.

We welcome the Auditor General's report. Thank you. It's very favourable. It indicates that the intents of the program have been largely met, and certainly, strengthening the integrity of the system is a top priority.

One of the things I believe I heard from Mr. Gallivan's testimony was the difference in opinion relating to the amount of fraud cases that have been investigated. Is there a difference between how the Auditor General categorizes these and how the IRCC categorizes them?

If you'd each like to respond to that, I'd appreciate it.

[Ted Gallivan]

I don't think there's a difference of opinion. The Auditor General is correct. For example, the top line number of 150,000 as potential fraud is correct. The IRCC, at the time, hadn't done the homework to distill that to the number of actual fraud, so the Auditor General was 100% correct, there are potentially 153,000 cases.

We've subsequently done the homework and have brought the number down significantly. We now believe that 22% of those cases are potential fraud cases. We have more work to do to determine who, within that reduced population, has actually left the country. That's something we need to do more systematically going forward.

From my perspective, there's no daylight between the OAG's findings and ours. Had we documented and done the work that we've now done at the time, she would have had a different number, I believe.

[Karen Hogan]

I'll agree with the deputy minister. I don't believe there's a difference of opinion in what we're saying. There are two buckets that we're talking about around this table. There were 153,000 students who were flagged as potentially not complying with the requirements of their permits. Only 4,000 were investigated, so we didn't look into the approximate 150,000.

Out of those 4,000, about half were closed without going further. The students stopped communicating and the files were then closed. That is not determining whether or not the students are following up on their permits. There's no disagreement on that, and I can't speak to the work that the department has done since our audit.

The department identified 800 cases of fraud. Our concern is that the department did not consider any action on those 800 files when action should have been taken. We highlighted, in our report, where all of those files are now. The majority have applied for another immigration status, and about half have already received it. It's that kind of thing that I hope better controls will help prevent or make sure that those individuals really should have received another status.

There is no disagreement at all between the deputy minister and me on fraud.

[Ron McKinnon, Liberal, Coquitlam—Port Coquitlam, BC]

It sounds like the investigation of potential fraud has been very adequately and satisfactorily addressed. Do you believe that?

[Ted Gallivan]

From my perspective, once we implement the action plans that we have with the OAG and before this committee, I think they will be, but we're not there yet.

There were a number of improvements. If you take a step back, there was a four-year plan to bring the numbers under control and increase controls on the student direct program being abused for asylum seeking. Those top-line things were done and have happened. In 2025, the OAG saw that we weren't done that four-year voyage. I think a number of actions that IRCC has under way and that we've committed to by the end of this calendar year will be necessary before your statement would be true.

[Karen Hogan]

If I could add to that, there were hundreds of thousands of students who came through the student direct stream. I would expect that the department will now look at the rigour they applied to any of those students when they apply for any other immigration status, because the rigour wasn't there in the first place. You now have the chance to put in a control at the second application.

[Ron McKinnon, Liberal, Coquitlam—Port Coquitlam, BC]

That brings me to a more general question, Mr. Gallivan.

What is your department's response to the feedback shared by the Auditor General, and what steps will your department be taking going forward to address these concerns?

[Ted Gallivan]

The most important message is that all indicators need to be followed through on. Regarding these very large numbers that we're talking about—150,000 others—I think the Auditor General and Canadians would expect to see IRCC go through those files and come to a determination. It's not good enough to say most of them have an innocent explanation. We have to do the homework.

We've already started to set up teams. We have issued procedures. In fact, for those field directions that were asked for, we have committed in our management action plan to begin to do that by September 2026. Once we do it and we get to a smaller number of people who applied for a visa under false pretenses, then we need to follow through in terms of a flag in the system, and we need to follow through in terms of any renewal.

With your colleagues earlier this week, we talked about the five-year ban: If somebody doesn't leave the country when they ought to, they could be subject to a five-year prohibition against re-entry. We need to manage the immigration system with greater control so the legitimate travellers and the legitimate students, which the vast majority are, can come to this country and study, and those who are trying to abuse the system suffer consequences and are disincentivized from doing it in the first place.

[Ron McKinnon, Liberal, Coquitlam—Port Coquitlam, BC]

I have a few seconds left. I'm interested in the numbers, which have fallen substantially in terms of approvals, but I understand the applications have fallen substantially as well and that the educational institutions have not been recruiting as vigorously.

Do you have any comment on that or explanation for that?

[Ted Gallivan]

There certainly has been a chill, so the perception may have been greater than the reality. There is an issue—and when we have time, we can come back to it—around the provincial allocations and unused spots. Right now, there are unused spots in terms of the seats allocated to the province. I would say internationally there was a message that Canada was being a little bit more rigorous, and I think it's a question of recalibrating that, because Canada benefits from high-impact, legitimate students. They're an asset to the country, so we have to make sure those students do continue to apply and come to Canada.

[Ron McKinnon, Liberal, Coquitlam—Port Coquitlam, BC]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Thank you very much.

I now give the floor to Mr. Lemire for six minutes.

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I would like to thank the Auditor General once again for her work and for the details she has provided on this issue.

Mr. Gallivan, there is one thing that astounds me—it may even be the most problematic aspect. The Auditor General wrote that the department did not know whether students with expired permits were leaving Canada. So the Auditor General worked with your colleagues at the Canada Border Services Agency to compile a list. Currently, we are focusing on a single program, the international student program, but this could be the case for many other programs.

Do you know how many people with expired permits left Canada?

Do you have figures for all programs that you could submit to the committee?

[Ted Gallivan]

No, we don't have exact numbers, and that's a problem. We have samples and projections. So we have a high-level picture, but we haven't managed the departures of visa holders in a systematic way.

Student programs are part of our first phase. We will establish a management framework within the system and procedures to properly manage departures. We intend to apply this to other visa programs as well. However, not everything is tied to information technology, or IT. That said, our IT team confirms that, in May of this year, we will have an indicator of who is in Canada for the first time.

This is an example, because the department had not previously considered managing departures. However, we are committed to doing so going forward.

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

According to figures from the Auditor General, there were 39,500 people unaccounted for. We do not know where the students are or whether they have left the country, but we should hear from them soon. It might be worthwhile, Mr. Chair, to hold another meeting to see where things stand with this follow-up.

I will now make the connection to the question my colleague, Mr. McKinnon, posed.

We are talking about the drop in approval rates, which is reportedly linked to the drop in application rates from universities. I think this might be related to stricter measures regarding these applications.

Is this indeed the case, or have relations with certain countries simply cooled, which would have caused a drop in their applications, as the statistics show?

[Ted Gallivan]

It is true that there are financial requirements. We have also cancelled the student direct stream. These are other factors, in addition to the environment.

I will now turn to my colleague so she can give you a more technical answer.

[Alexis Graham, Acting Assistant Deputy Minister, Economic Programs, Department of Citizenship and Immigration]

I would say it's probably due to cooled relations.

In terms of approval rates, it's important to note that they are primarily a function of recruitment practices of provinces and designated learning institutions. IRCC can't approve an application that doesn't meet the requirements of the program, and those requirements did change, as we've all recognized.

There has been this transition period from a more facilitative approach to a more controlled and disciplined way of managing the program based on allocations and lower numbers. That has created some need for these institutions to look at student recruitment differently, so we are seeing those approval numbers being a little bit lower. However, we do anticipate them to rebound in the future as well.

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

The Auditor General’s figures speak for themselves. In 2023, nearly one in two students came from India under the student direct stream, which was established in 2018 and terminated in 2024. I still see a fairly direct link between this and the decline in applications.

Furthermore, the Auditor General stated that you identified integrity risks in 2022 and that no concrete action was taken thereafter.

Today, these students are still in the country. They will renew their study permits or apply for permanent residence. Currently, 94% to 95% of applications are approved, even though, according to the Auditor General’s data, 12% of applications show indicators that some may be ineligible, the majority of which came from the student direct stream.

What measures have you put in place to address this?